An LCD apparatus is a non-emissive display apparatus receiving light from an external to display an image, so that the LCD apparatus separately needs a backlight assembly that supplies the light to the LCD apparatus. The backlight assembly generally requires characteristics such as a high brightness, a high light efficiency, a uniform brightness, a long life, a light weight, a low cost or the like. For example, a backlight assembly used to an LCD for a laptop computer needs a lamp having the high light efficiency and the long life so as to reduce a power consumption thereof and a backlight assembly used to an LCD for a monitor or a television set needs a lamp having the high brightness.
Particularly, the LCD for the television set demands the higher brightness and longer life than that of the LCD for the laptop computer. However, a CCFL (Cold Cathode Fluorescent Lamp) is not appropriate to satisfy the demands of the LCD for the television set, so that an external electrode fluorescent lamp has been developed as a substitute for the CCFL. The external electrode fluorescent lamp is classified into an EEFL (External Electrode Fluorescent Lamp) having an external electrode disposed at both outer end portions of the lamp and an EIFL (External Internal Fluorescent Lamp) having an external electrode disposed at one outer end portion.
Recently, a parallel driving method that drives a plurality of lamps using only one inverter has been developed. When driving the lamps in parallel, a feedback circuit is needed to prevent-an image from being deteriorated and a circuit of the LCD apparatus from being damaged.